Where are you Taka?

Do you ever stop and remember people you used to know but haven't stayed in contact with? Well, I do. For some reason a memory bounced, unbidden, into my head while I was brushing my teeth this morning. I saw an image of a tall Japanese guy dressed in black jeans and a white open collared shirt. He was standing on a carpeted stage with a microphone in his hand. His long shiny hair covered most of his face. He was singing Can't Help Falling In Love by Elvis Presley. And he was doing it well.

No, that's an understatement: He was fantastic.

Takahiro Matzuzaki was a roomie of mine during the nineties. He was from Tokyo, Japan and came to America with one goal: to learn English. You see, he was a singer/songwriter in a rock-n-roll band in Tokyo. His group played 50s and 60s music--mostly the Beatles and, of course, Elvis Presley.

Taka, Tobias, Marc, and I used to frequent the Acapulco Mexican Restaurant in Fresno for cheap drinks and karaoke. However when Taka first announced to us, with an unstable shot of tequila in hand, that he was going to sing Can't Help Falling In Love I was very afraid for him. He hardly spoke any English and I thought there was no way this mumbling Japanese guy was going to pull off Elvis.

But he did; and the audience loved him!

When Taka first came to America he knew two words: "help" and "there." And he learned very quickly how his deficiency in English was going to be a problem. In fact, his first day in America his host mother forgot to pick him up at the airport. Taka had no idea what he was supposed to do, having only been in America for ten minutes.

So, naturally, Taka sought out an airport employee and uttered one of the words he knew: "Help." Then he pointed outside where cars were gathering, picking up and dropping off passengers, and he said the other word he knew: "There." Well, obviously the employee had no idea what Taka wanted. So Taka was forced to wait for three hours for his host mother to show up.

By the time Taka moved into my apartment he knew a little bit more English. By the time he left to go back to Japan he was pretty proficient. I like to think I had something to do with Taka's improvement in English. We spent a lot of time drinking and arguing about politics and religion. But I believe much of his vocabulary was gleaned from watching hours and hours of Beavis and Butthead.

So now I ask: Where are you Taka? Are you still in a band in Tokyo? Are you still singing Elvis? And, like, did you score?